How Humpty Dumpty Killed Romance
by planet p
Summary: Story Repost! What happens after Annie is kidnapped. William/Edna, in a way.


**How Humpty-Dumpty Killed R****omance **by planet p

**Disclaimer **I don't own _the Pretender_ or any of its characters.

**Author's Notes** Story Repost, written 17/9/2006.

* * *

It was always the same, the same routine, for as long as she could remember.

She didn't care for it anymore, but it wasn't as though he really did either. It was just something that they did. Like a chore.

Most times she just lay there and wondered how he possibly expected her to read her romance novel when the page was jittering all over the place.

* * *

Six o'clock was dinner.

Seven thirty was Annie's bedtime.

By eight o'clock she had finished up the dishes.

An hour was spent reading in bed.

So it was always relegated nine o'clock.

Because ten o'clock was lights out for her. A girl needed her beauty sleep.

* * *

It was always the same, like clockwork. She started to wonder, because she never felt anything more than annoyance anymore.

The lamp light was poor. She had to squint. It always gave her a headache in the morning.

But then, she had given up pretending so long ago now, she wondered when it had ever been real. She sighed. It didn't seem right on Annie that it hadn't been real just once, that her baby girl, her sweet precious honey cakes, hadn't been conceived with love.

She only ended up shaking her head. She never told her baby that it had been in the back of some shabby-looking jalopy. There were a lot of things she left out. She started to count them off on her fingers. One: she was blind drunk. Two: she'd only done it to piss her roommate off. Three: it was crap. Four: she was just too stoned to notice. Five: the takeaway was worse. Six: this she noticed, when she puked it up all over said roommate the morning after. Seven: the next time was in her dorm. Eight: she lied and said her roommate's bed was next one up. Nine: next one up was her bed. Ten: her roommate smashed the radio. Eleven: she missed her favourite serial. Twelve: that meant war.

Edna threw out an arm and flopped her book down on the bedside cabinet. William had that look in his eyes. She knew that look. She liked it better when it was James giving her that look. But still. Heaving a laden sigh, she pushed his head into her cleavage and took up observation of the ceiling. She detested kissing. It was the worst kind of unhygienic she could think of. Few and far between, it never failed to cause a shudder up her back. She figured it was because as a girl she had always thought of kissing as romantic. Like the way he daddy would by her mummy flowers every Friday, and she would ring him at work lunch-times just to see how he was faring.

She blinked to the ceiling and wondered what her obsession with romance was. For as long as she had known Humpty-Dumpty was just another innovative this-is-how-humans-torture-each-other-nicely story, she had known romance was just a state of mind.

A state of mind she was no longer partial to. It would have been nice if she was. But then again, the chemistry just wasn't right. Whoever had fixed this one had botched it, drinking on the job or the sort.

* * *

Annie took her roller-skates for a walk weekend afternoons. William went with. It wasn't as though he cared much for his wife's vinyl anyhow.

Most days they went down to the river by the old railway bridge. William liked to listen to the unquiet. Annie liked the cigarettes her mother wasn't there to stop her father sharing. She never ever dobbed.

Sometimes she asked her daddy how he had met her mummy and he told her it was because she missed her bus. It was one of those good lies. The sort you tell your children when you don't want them waking up in the middle of the night worrying for their genetics.

* * *

William stood leant against the wall with his eyes closed. The radio was playing quietly but it annoyed the Hell out of him.

Edna sat peeling potatoes for mash.

He left it on for her sake. She always looked so lonely. Lonely like she could die and no one would really notice.

He wondered if he would notice. She was his wife.

* * *

Edna kept the windows shut. She never cared about the smoke anymore. She had finished peeling the potatoes ten minutes ago, and now they sat in the shiny silver sink, slowly going brown.

She had meant to cut them in quarters and put them on the stove. She only stared as icy water filled the sink and overflowed onto her feet. She wondered when William was going to notice and hit her.

* * *

He only noticed when the news came over the radio and this time he had to switch it off. He never listened to the news. It was all just lies and glorification, and he didn't much care for it anymore. Not after Annie.

He never even hit her. She had been half hoping he would make it nice and good, knock some sense into her.

He simply nodded to the sink. "Mmm. Water's getting a bit high." And then because she didn't react, he walked over and turned the tap off himself.

Edna stood staring out the darkened kitchen window. "She's not coming home, is she?"

William passed her his cigarette. "Pardon?" But he had heard alright.

Edna took the cigarette and coughed loudly, passing it back to her husband. She squinted and made a disgusted face.

He simply shrugged.

Edna didn't raise the subject again. She wondered what she had done wrong. She had to have done something wrong. Her baby girl wasn't coming home. And she had been so looking forward to showing her daughter her new record. Maybe they would even had listened to it once or twice in a row, the neighbours be damned.

But now there was no one.

She snatched the cigarette from her husband and took a puff, coughing her guts out.

William patted her on the back softly, as though he might actually have cared once. She wondered what he had been on that day. The usual, most probably.

Nobody danced in the streets anymore. Rallies were called riots and people died.

* * *

Edna turned away from the window and frowned. "The radio's been turned off," she observed.

William nodded absently. "Mmm."

Edna sighed.

"Hey, ya know what, let's get takeaway?" William suggested brightly, watching his wife. He eyes remained that same dull.

She closed her eyes immensely slow, and moved blindly towards the telephone. Her eyes flicked open in time not avoid walking into her husband. She took the cigarette offered and stepped around him, passing it back on her way out into the hall.

He followed her out, a bit like a stray puppy dog.

* * *

He knew she'd just chuck it later, but it didn't matter. She'd always liked ice-cream; even in winter. She might even smile for a short moment. And he thought that it would be worth it.

* * *

Later, he helped her put the leftovers in the fridge. The light was dead. He wondered that she hadn't mentioned it before.

He turned back to the table to put away the lemonade, when she caught his arm. She was backed against Doris (he always smiled when he thought of her odd little habit of naming appliances). He frowned slightly and made to turn back to the table.

"Stay."

He blinked at the softness in her voice. Like autumn leaves. And cobble. He always thought of cobble too.

"Say you will."

"I'm not going anywhere," he replied softly, a hint of uncertainty in his voice.

Her eyes were dark with storm.

He almost smiled.

She reached out a hand. Her thumb caught his bottom lip. He shuddered, still gazing deep into her eyes as though the answer might be there.

Edna let her finger fall from his face and took a handful of his shirt, pulling him close to her. She brushed his neck with her breath. "Kiss me."

He shuddered a second time. It scared him to hear her like that.

"I promise I won't scream." She took a heavy breath and continued in a wistful voice. "Only if you want me to."

William pulled away from her.

They came up against the side board and cupboards. "Kiss me."

She yanked on the hem of his shirt, momentarily looking down as she straightened the creases with her tiny hands; began fingering the buttons with steady hands.

His own nerves weren't nearly as steady.

Her eyes slowly lifted to meet his, dark and glistening with dew, almost hypnotic.

He brought a shaking hand up to her face. She took his hand in hers and brushed a stray lock from her eyes, tucking it snugly behind her ear.

He barely noticed when she took his other hand and placed it around her waist. She tasted of ice-cream and fake strawberry.

* * *

William thought it a little sad, that now they were closer, they would have to separate again. But he knew what must be done, and it was all he had left now. This job.

He never liked to hope on dreams or wish on stars. Dreams inevitably ended; stars burnt out and died. Still, he decided to wait until after she had fallen asleep. He might even wish her 'sweet dreams'.

He liked to think it was nicer that way.

Perhaps she wouldn't wake up and he wouldn't miss her quite so much because he'd know she had gone to a better place.

He sighed. It was coming on light now. Tendrils of day began to ease away the morning twilight, seeping into the shadows.

The brooding silence was broken by the sound of a door slamming; raised voices. The neighbours were arguing at full volume again.

William leant across and placed the needle down on the bedside cabinet, glad Edna wouldn't wake.

She was dreaming now. Perhaps they were even nice dreams. He would never know.

* * *

_Thanks for reading._


End file.
